Diageo's Australian marketing boss Matt Bruhn has come out with a raging endorsement of award shows after cleaning up at Spikes Asia last week with Leo Burnett.
Although it’s seen as good sport among many marketers to dismiss creative shows as self-serving and generally irrelevant, Matt Bruhn told AdNews if creativity was considered a real differentiator for brands in a crowded, tough market, award shows played an important role for the industry.
“There is an element of self-serving in advertising awards but you get that in any awards ceremony, whether it’s the Academy Awards or in fact the Bar of the Year Awards which we’ve just been to,” he said.
“But what they are and should be is inspiration for our marketers to be more creative. This creativity is winning us awards but it’s also driving our brands. If you believe creativity drives performance, awards are a nice recognition for the fact that you are trying to be creative. They are about us aspiring to great creativity.”
Bruhn said there was more onus on brand marketers today than ever to lift creative standards to achieve growth.
“At the moment if you do ordinary creative you are going to decline or be flat with the market and you have to be better or great just to get growth,” he said. “The economic conditions are forcing people to really push the boat out if they want growth.”
Read more of Matt Bruhn’s thoughts on creativity and the need for marketers to take bigger creative risks in this Friday’s print edition of AdNews.
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